A Bowthorpe mother who uses humour to cope with life as a mother of a child with special needs has been nominated for a national award for her blog.

Alex Ozansoy's only child, Aleyna, six, suffered from oxygen starvation at birth, and had a traumatic start to life including operations and a stay in intensive care.

She was later diagnosed with global developmental delay and more recently microcephaly, a neurological disorder in which the circumference of the head is smaller than average, because the brain does not develop as it should.

After Aleyna's difficult birth Alex developed severe post-natal depression, culminating in a breakdown at the end of 2007.

She said: 'Since both my husband and I have climbed out of a rather dark hole, we have injected the comedy back into our lives as a coping mechanism and I tell you what, it bloody works.

'We don't want pity. We want Aleyna to be included. We want to help stop the stigma still attached to people living with disabilities. I am not talking about laughing at people. I am talking about laughing alongside them. These people have a sense of humour too. Aleyna is an amazing, hilarious, wonderful, and beautiful little person.'

Alex has been nominated for the Mum and Dad (MAD) Blog Awards, a national awards scheme for parent bloggers, based on her web diary, called 'Doing it all for Aleyna'.

The 38-year-old, who lives in Rimer Close, Bowthorpe, updates her blog with humorous and touching stories of her daily life bringing up Aleyna. The light-hearted approach to the blog, which focuses on the fun Alex and Aleyna have together, has been praised by many in the 'mummy blogging' community.

Alex, a full-time mum, only began blogging in September when she found herself feeling lonely and bored as her husband works away a lot. Baba is a paragliding instructor and regularly returns to Turkey, where he was born, to work.

She said: 'I am really thrilled to have reached the finals of the MAD Blog Awards, and it's fantastic to be in such great company, with so many great blogs. Writing the blog has been difficult at times, but it is extremely cathartic to write about my little girl's special needs and has allowed me to make great friends.'

There are 15 different categories, with five blogs reaching the finals in each group. Her fans have four weeks to vote for their favourite blogs at the MAD Blog awards website, www.the-mads.com.

Alex's blog has been shortlisted for the best blog writer category, which recognises online page-turners.

The winners of the MAD Blog Awards will be announced in September, and the winning blogger in the category will receive a 3G Kindle, an electronic reading device.

Alex's blog is at doingitallforaleyna.blogspot.com

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